Last Saturday, interior designer Suzanne Shaker emailed us images of the Strawberry-Rhubarb Crumble she was making at her wondrous Shelter Island home. The recipe is from Sally’s cookbook A New Way to Cook. On Sunday, Suzanne sent a follow-up email with a gluten-free improvisation she’d made on the basic recipe. We’re publishing the recipe, below, along with…
Read MoreThank You to Our New Subscribers!!
It has been quite a couple of days since we LEAPT and launched our new Friends with Benefits subscription program. We’ve been knocked out by the generous outpouring of support in subscriptions, comments and emails sent. We are deeply touched and heartened. Thank you for being SO there. Photo via SF Girl By the Bay via…
Read MoreMaya Angelou’s Wise Words about Life and Table
On Wednesday, Maria Robledo sent us this image of a quote by writer and civil rights activist Maya Angelou. The following day, we learned that Angelou had passed away. The women had a WAY with words and with living. So we’ve selected a few as tribute.
Read MoreHow to Salvage Stained Cloth: Embroider It!
Photographer Virginia del Giudice has both a wonderful eye AND, we discovered, a fine hand with fabrics. Witness her beautiful “fix” of some permanently-stained fabric. It reminds us of kintsugi, the artful repair of damaged things.
Read MoreMurals Inspired by Frescoes to DIY or Buy
These images Castello Sonnino’s frescoes that Peggy Markel emailed us from Tuscany got us thinking about mural services we’ve come across in our wanderings, and just what images we would put BIG on a wall.
Read MoreIf We Never Tried, We’d Never Know… What’s Possible
All morning long we watched as Tinypass alerts came into Improvised Life’s inbox, announcing subscribers to our new Friends with Benefits subscription service. They landed like butterflies, from people inspired by IL to help it survive, “being there” as we risk, leap, try, see what happens…
Read MoreMick Jagger Redefines Great Grandfather Stereotype
At 70 years young, Rolling Stones frontman Mick Jagger recently became a great-grandfather CRASH! There goes the stereotype of what an aged grandpa looks like. Check out this clip.
Read MoreWHAT IF You Lived In a Chocolate Coated Room?
Artist Anya Gallaccio coated an entire room covered in thick dark chocolate, beckoning gallery visitors to lick, pick, stroke. Her work, she says, is about unpredictability in the materials and collaborations.
Read MoreCheap, Portable Lightweight Laptop Stand (Kickstarter)
When we first saw this cardboard laptop stand we thought: Who needs that? We can just rig a stack of books to raise our laptop. Then we saw it in action and thought of all the places it would be useful.
Read MoreAn Urban Patio Prairie of Ornamental Grasses
After we’d been living in the Harlem Laboratory for a while and gotten our bearings, we turned our atttention to the 50-square-foot patio that overlooks a glorious park in New York City. What to plant? Our friend-with-a-green-thumb Maria Robledo said simply: “Grasses”. Grasses? “Yeah, plant ornamental grasses on one side of the terrace. They’ll form…
Read MoreWe Launch! Become a Friend with Benefits
Today’s the day! We’re throwing our baby up in the air, and we hope you’ll help us catch her! Today we start our Friends with Benefits subscriptions. If you subscribe, you continue to receive all Improvised Life posts and full access to our vast archive. If not, you’ll be able to read ten posts per…
Read MoreBeing There for Friends —or Strangers — in Trouble (Muhammad Ali)
After we stumbled on this image of former world heavyweight champion Muhammad Ali talking to an obviously distraught, suicidal man, we had to know the story behind it. Was it for real? We found this remarkable 1981 clip of Walter Cronkite reporting the story on CBS News:
Read MoreHelp Improvised Life Leap…Tomorrow
For the past 4+ years, Improvised Life has published 5 days a week, upwards of 2500 articles and 8000 images. It has been a labor of love, full of pleasures and rewards and, for the past while, serious challenges and demands. Our “reality sandwiches” include 60+ hours a week of Sally’s reporting, writing, and editing…
Read MoreThe Unexpected Beauty of a Matless, Glassless Picture Frame
Recently, we gave our friend Maria Robledo a silver picture frame we’d had for many years. It was handmade and so beautifully and simply wrought, we’d never put a glass or mat in it, or even a picture. In Maria’s hands, it became something totally else. We’d never SEEN it that way…
Read MoreSoften an Angular Modern Space with Rounds
Many modern spaces, including our own Laboratory, suffer from having so many right angles, rectangles, linearity, that they can be a bit harsh. The simple solution is to shake them up with rounds, patterns, art. We love the solution in this image found at Bohemian Homes:
Read More12 More Commandments Culled from Commencement Speeches
Over the past few weeks, we’ve collect close to 50 great rules and principles for living from Commencement speeches and a tweet of new Commandments…Now we’re mulling how to hone it down to the most essential.
Read MoreHow to Eat a Watermelon (Happy Memorial Day!)
Our friend Holton Rower eats baby watermelons by slicing it in half and eating it with a soup spoon: a perfect and refreshing improvisation to start the summer season. Happy Memorial Day from Improvised Life! Thanks Holton!
Read MoreStrawberry Rhubarb Milkshake, an Unexpected Dinner Party Dessert
This image from Livet Hemma looks exactly like a Strawberry-Rhubarb Milkshake I devised years ago when I was monkeying around with rhubarb and strawberries, which are full-tilt right now. It got me hankering for one, and reminded me what an unexpected and delightful dessert they make for dinner parties. So I thought I’d share how to make it…
Read More‘Things Come Apart’ will Teach You How Things Work
(Video link HERE.) Photographer Todd McLellan’s Things Come Apart is an expansion of his original Disassembly Series, and the focus of a book by that name. His images of deconstructed items that have, are, or will be in our everyday lives have a curious effect: They demystify their seeming complexity and afford a big leap in understanding how they…
Read MoreA Cheap, Easy Solution to Standing Desk Leg Fatigue
We know a lot of people who have created standing desks and love them (and we’ve posted over the years.) They generally feel energized because their bodies are, in effect, exercising just by standing as they work. They have, however, almost universally complained of one problem: leg fatigue. Standing for hours each day puts stress on…
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